


🐉💀

by blunderbuss



Category: Pocket Monsters: Sword & Shield | Pokemon Sword & Shield Versions
Genre: M/M, the New York 'BEYONCE?' gif but it says 'POKEMON?'
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-20
Updated: 2019-12-20
Packaged: 2021-02-25 21:41:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,096
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21742366
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blunderbuss/pseuds/blunderbuss
Summary: Slow dancing (eventually).
Relationships: Kibana | Raihan/Nezu | Piers, Raihan/Piers, piers/raihan
Comments: 19
Kudos: 200





	🐉💀

**Author's Note:**

> *casts social anxiety on piers* i'm sorry king 😔✊  
> i told myself i wasn't going to do the thing where you use the name of a pokemon in a metaphor instead of an animal but i-

Someone tapped twice on Piers’ shoulder. He turned and at first saw no one he recognized in the crowd behind him. Then his eyes met Raihan’s. 

The sight of him shot a little jolt through his chest. But he was far enough away that Piers wondered if it wasn’t somebody else who had wanted his attention, until Raihan gestured towards the ballroom entrance with his thumb. His expression was stony; Piers thought maybe something was wrong. 

Raihan didn’t wait. He turned his back on Piers and stepped out into the main hall without a glance back. 

Piers chided himself as he wove through the crowd after him, willing his pulse to slow down. This certainly didn’t seem like a social call. He set his champagne flute on the nearest table (glad to be rid of it as, he’d been politely suffering through the stuff) and left the ballroom. 

Under usual circumstances he would’ve been irrationally worried that, if something _was_ wrong, it would have to do with Marnie, if a few minutes earlier he hadn’t watched her be safely whisked away by the new Galar champion. He'd been hoping that would be his out to escape the entire evening, leaving her in the company of the little champion and no one else the wiser that the ex-gym leader was no longer in attendance (why he was invited, even, Piers couldn’t say; they hadn't paid him as much notice when he _was_ still a full-fledged leader). But he had felt he owed it to the orchestra — a decent one, he thought — to give at least one full song his full attention before he made his escape. A mistake, apparently.

The crowd in the hall was thinner, and yet he had somehow lost sight of Raihan; taller than the tallest by half a head and still he managed to disappear. Piers felt a twinge of irritation. Did he want him to follow or not? 

He awkwardly craned around groups of conversation until at last he spotted him, eons down the hall. He stood by set of closed double doors with his hands in the pockets of his slate gray suit. As soon as Piers spotted him, Raihan nodded his head towards the doors, opened one, and stepped through. 

Piers huffed, and began to steel himself as he clacked his way down the hall. Second to being some kind of crisis, he dearly hoped it wasn’t some gym boys’ thing he was about to walk into. He really didn’t need any joshing ‘round with the lads tonight. He could only really handle one at a time anyway, as they formed an exhausting nexus of Growlithe-like energy in a group. 

He cracked open one of the doors just wide enough to slink through, and found himself in near darkness. 

His eyes adjusted to the electric chandeliers’ low light, and he realized he was standing in another, unused ballroom. Tables and chairs were filed neatly against the far walls. It was smaller than the room currently being used for the banquet, and judging by the volume of the orchestra he guessed he was only one room away. The low din of conversation in the hall was almost entirely muted with the doors shut behind him, and other than the muffled orchestra, the room was quiet and still. Piers winced. Was this going to be some weird, frat-like bonding thing in the dark? 

“Hello…” 

“Only me.”

Another jolt sparked through Piers’ chest. He turned and spotted Raihan at the nearest table, half seated on it. His hands were still in his pockets, and his expression had lost its stoniness and warmed into something Piers told himself he was just imagining in the dim light. 

Piers’ eyes nervously flicked around the room. Maybe the other boys just hadn’t arrived yet. “What’d you need?”

Raihan cleared his throat and leaned off the table, rising to his full enormous height. “Well, I was wondering…” He ambled in Piers’ direction, his head down. “… if… you would…” He was an arm’s length away from Piers when he took a step to the side, towards the empty center of the room. He raised his head, his eyes nearly glowing even in the low light, and extended a hand towards Piers. “… care for a dance?”

“Ey?” 

Piers took a step away. His back met with the closed door behind him with a thump. 

Raihan’s easy smile turned apologetic. “Just the one. Dunno how many we’ll get before the speeches start.” He wiggled the fingers of his outstretched hand, and winked. “Two would be better.”

Piers must look as if Raihan had a gun pointed at him. His brain felt like it had seized-up; the wink took it offline entirely. He could only gape at Raihan, like a sodding Magikarp. 

At long last, a few words bubbled up and out of his slack-jawed mouth in a tiny voice, and they were the eloquent: “You taking the piss?”

Raihan shook his head slowly and widely, looking increasingly amused. “I am not.” He opened and closed his hand a few times. “But the arm’s getting a bit tired.”

From the only corner of Piers’ mind that still seemed to be chugging came the thought: _Well, that’s not good._

He could turn around. Open the door. Walk away and pretend he dreamt this. But, as if he was already dreaming, he watched his own hand gradually peal itself off the door he was braced against.

Tenderly, as if Piers could be spooked into bolting back into the wild at a sudden move — probably true — Raihan took it, resting his thumb on top of it, and guided Piers further into the room. 

_What are you doing!?_ came another thought, from another faraway corner of Piers’ skull, _Turn around! Leave!_ But he was too preoccupied by the sight of their hands together to take heed of his own advice. _Fuckin’ hell,_ Raihan’s was twice the size of his own. 

By the time the rest of Piers’ brain had started to reboot, they had already made it to the middle of the empty room. Raihan was leading Piers forward, to stand in front of him. Piers’ head sprang up suddenly.

“I can’t dance,” he announced.

He caught just a little of Raihan’s dreamy — _Dreamy?_ — expression, before amused shock took its place. 

“Ex- _scuse_ me…” Raihan laughed, “The rockstar? C’mon…” He tilted his head to the side with a beautiful smile.

Piers shook his head quickly, eyes wide with dread. “I mean it,” he said as if it was a threat. 

Raihan appraised him, head still half tilted. He was too handsome, far too handsome, and _far_ too close. Piers had to look down at the tips of his own dress shoes. And now that Raihan was no longer in his line of sight, he was acutely reminded of Raihan’s hand holding his; his thumb resting against his knuckles. 

“Can you shuffle a bit?” asked Raihan lightly, “That’s all.”

Piers didn’t reply.

“And if it’s any consolation…” The thumb on Piers’ knuckles moved minutely. “… I can’t sing.” 

A panicked little laugh burst from Piers, but he still said nothing. He must look ridiculous; a cornered Wimpod trying futilely to scuttle up the walls. Every ounce of this embarrassment was his own damn fault; he could’ve — _should’ve_ — pivot-turned on his heel and marched right back out of the door— 

Very suddenly, a horribly loud noise erupted out of Raihan. 

Piers’ head shot up again. The hot sweat that been collecting on him everywhere went cold. Raihan was “singing.” 

Piers thumped the flat of his hand against Raihan’s chest. _“Fucking! Fuck— idiot!”_ he hissed, “ _Stop it!”_

Raihan, who had thrown his head back to let loose his operatic yodeling, brought it down again and ceased his awful ruckus as quickly as he'd started. He fixed Piers’ eyes on his with an entirely mischievous grin. “We’re even.” 

Piers somehow had the wherewithal to give him a good, proper scowl, and began to pull his hand away from Raihan’s chest. Raihan placed his own on top of it, catching it gently. 

Piers' entire body thrummed with his pulse like a bass drum as he watched Raihan guide the hand up to his own shoulder. When Piers kept it there, Raihan then moved the hand down, heading for Piers’ waist. It was slow enough to be a question; a request for official permission. Piers watched it nearing, bracing himself as though it were a punch to the gut. He tensed until he was as still as stone. But he didn’t pull away. 

The gigantic hand curled around his waist and hip, wide enough to cover both at once; warm even through Piers’ suit jacket. Piers’ eyes fell again to the floor and he screwed them shut. And, as if he didn’t have enough to deal with, he was suddenly very aware of Raihan’s cologne. It was very nearly sensory overload. 

Raihan began to move his feet, leading Piers to the side ever-so-slightly by his two points of contact. 

“Just follow my lead…” he said, sounding as if he suspected that Piers might, in fact, know how to do this, despite his declaration.

And Piers had, of course, been forced to do his fair share of pairs’ dancing in school. But he hadn’t since, and the sense memory had him feeling, on top of everything else, like a fifteen-year-old. 

Piers kept his gaze locked on the bottom button of Raihan’s suit, shuffling his feet in time with his. He was able to once again process the sound of the orchestra’s music from the next room over. Another song had just begun. 

“Not so bad, now, ey?” asked Raihan in a low murmur that shot a chill down Piers’ spine.

Despite _that,_ the slow rebooting of his shock-numb brain seemed to have reached, at last, a high enough percentage of functionality to allow Piers to remember that he ought be wondering what the hell was going on. 

“Why are you doing this?” he asked cooly. He impressed himself with the sobriety of it.

“Why?” Raihan echoed casually, not missing a beat. He then answered easily: “‘Cause you’re pretty.” 

A noise like a choked cough burst out of Piers. He hoped it could be mistaken for a scoff, and for good measure he followed it up with a disaffected, “Come off it,” but even that came out wavering. He felt like a bolt of lightning had struck him from inside, leaving his lips tingling along with the rest of him.

Raihan was saying what anybody would want to hear as they were being danced with; silly, stock flattery. It had to be. And, therefore, his question went unanswered: why? 

Piers thought he'd successfully convinced himself that he had imagined the way Raihan began to look at him since the championship. For there was simply, logically, _no_ way Mr. 10K-Likes-Per-Selfie himself would see anything in the scuzzy Spikemuther other than, maybe, a decent battle. That’s why he had seemed especially interested in him after their first match, Piers had told himself — and told himself, and told himself. 

Did Raihan merely want to see if he _could_ get Piers to let his guard down; another notch in what Piers assumed had to be a very well-marked belt? Or, far worse: did somebody put him up to this? 

Piers’ sense of self-preservation, overactive on a good day, was cranking away, easily producing worst case scenarios as the two of them continued to dance in the dark room. Visions of the others busting into the room with their phone cameras at the ready rolled before him like a horror film. Piers began to gather what courage he still had — he’d call all this off at last. It was too illogical; too surreal. _Something_ was about to spoil this, surely. There had to be a catch that would snare him sooner or later.

Meanwhile, Raihan just hummed, thinkingly. _“And_ you nearly kicked my ass. Was mad for that.”

Piers successfully scoffed this time. “Forget it, forget it.” 

“I could go on…”

“Should not have asked.”

Raihan chuckled, and Piers could hear it — feel it — vibrating in his chest. With each breath he took, Piers could smell his accursed cologne. 

“Speaking of which, you still owe me a rematch,” added Raihan.

Despite everything, Piers wheezed an incredulous laugh. _I_ owe _one to you, now, do I?_ he thought and almost said, but it caught in his throat. He silently stared, the little he could, over Raihan’s shoulder at the ballroom wall.

Raihan dipped his head a bit lower, a bit closer to Piers’ ear. “What happens to your cheeky mouth when I’m around? Keep thinking you’ll have a comeback for me.”

Whatever the reason may be, nefarious or otherwise, Raihan seemed intent on trying to make Piers explode. 

“How ‘bout we both shut up a while,” mumbled Piers through a dry mouth.

“Well, that’s a bit more like it.” 

Piers could hear the smile in his voice. He tried to gather himself again, readying to stop their gentle dancing and somberly step away. Then Raihan leaned his head forward so that his cheek was pressed against Piers’ temple, feather light. The barely-there scratch of stubble made Piers' breath hitch. 

“One more?” Raihan murmured. Had the song ended? 

Piers couldn’t think of an answer before another began. 

It was slower, lead by a single violin, and was particularly romantic, damn it all. Raihan eased their already-slow-dancing to match the tempo, and the hand on Piers’ hip snuck around to his lower back.

“I did mean it,” Raihan murmured, so quietly that Piers wouldn’t have heard if they weren’t alone in an empty room, “You’re very, very pretty.”

Piers angled his searing face down to hide it, his forehead brushing against Raihan’s shoulder as he did. He wished he somehow had the foresight to take his suit jacket off before all this had started. His skin felt baked with heat, as if Raihan was giving him a sunburn through all the layers of his suit.

Raihan folded Piers’ outstretched hand into his, and brought it in to rest against his own chest; over his heart. With the hand on his back, Piers felt wrapped up in him. 

He returned a little pressure against where Raihan’s face was pressed against his. His eyes fluttered closed. 

_Oh, sod it,_ Piers thought. 

Whatever this was — a trick; a dream; maybe something more daunting than either — might as well take what he could, and enjoy it while the getting was good. And boy, was it. _That could be a lyric._

They were barely moving at all now; two close-together bodies in the middle of a still room, turning in a circle as slow as a planet, a hair’s breadth at a time. The longer they went without anyone bursting into the room to ruin it all, the more Piers’ drumming heart slowed and became a steady, soothing rhythm, like a metronome.

Eventually, he even allowed himself to selfishly try and memorize Raihan’s warmth. And the feel of his skin on his hand and his head. And the smell of his sodding cologne (heady and fairly strong, of course, but in a way that made Piers feel positively drunk).

He felt like he was floating. He imagined Raihan had closed his eyes, too.

Raihan slowed their dance to a stop so subtly that, at first, Piers thought he was imagining it. He became very distantly aware that there was no longer any music. _Already?_

Someone had started speaking into a microphone, followed by the muted roar of applause. 

“Should probably head back,” whispered Raihan, head still resting against Piers’.

“Right,” Piers breathed, shaky.  Neither of them moved. 

Piers’ heart began to pick its tempo up again, and he very carefully brought his head out from the addictive warmth between Raihan’s shoulder and face. He braced himself to meet Raihan’s eyes. And when he did, he realized he wasn’t just the eyes — shinning and heated — he had to worry about but his lips, too, and the terrifyingly little space between them and his own. _Would he…_

“Really ought to do this again sometime,” Raihan murmured, a smiling growing. A bit of light caught on one of his famous canines and glinted off it. 

Between the sight of it, and the words, and the ghost of his breath on his face, Piers had to break his eyes away once again. He instead stared hard at the lapel of Raihan’s suit. A beat passed as Piers processed what Raihan had said, and he laughed, giddy.

“That before or after the rematch?” he said quietly, still looking at Raihan’s lapel. 

It was Raihan’s turn to laugh, darkly, in a way that made Piers shiver. He knew Raihan had felt it, but he was past caring now. 

“There’s that mouth of yours,” Raihan then rumbled in his ear, easily sending a hot wave that crashed up and back down over Piers and settled low in his belly. _Fuck's sake..._ He let his head fall lightly again against Raihan’s chest, and he sighed, defeated. Raihan snickered in his ear. 

“Alright. Going now,” Piers resolved, managing to sound long-suffering. 

But, secretly, he was relieved that the weight of the moment had passed and become light; teasing. Maybe he’d get a little time to face the insurmountable fact that, apparently, this had _not_ been a prank, or a spiteful dare, or another notch in a belt; all excruciating alternatives, yes. But they sure would have been simpler than whatever this really was.

Piers took a half step back, determined not to look at Raihan even as he slid his hand from Piers’ back and let it linger on his waist, and neither did he quite relinquish the hand he still had held against his chest. Then came a sound that sobered-up Piers in an instant: the camera shutter sound effect of a phone camera.

His eyes shot to the entrance of the ballroom. Two figures leaned in halfway from the door, and the silhouette of a Rotom-phone hovered in the air beside them.

“Oops,” said Marnie, before she and the new champion whisked themselves away, Rotom-phone in tow.

_“Marnie!”_ Piers bellowed. He sounded like a gunshot to his own ears, thoroughly shattering the covert silence he and Raihan had been working so hard to maintain. 

He raced after them, moving faster than he ever had in recent memory. He took one look back at Raihan, left alone in the middle of the room: doubled over, arms resting on his knees, and shoulders heaving as he laughed. 

**Author's Note:**

> really wrote a pokemon fanfiction. ok


End file.
